QUOTE OF THE DAY 5-31-13

“Essentially, all of these central banks are creating vast sums of money and thrusting themselves into the world economy as gigantic buyers of stuff, be they mortgages or treasury bonds. In theory, the banks will eventually “sterilize” or reverse the process by selling off all this stuff they’ve bought and draining the economy of its “excess liquidity,” but no one knows when that will be, and for the time being, QE is pure financial steroids.

It’s stimulus on a much bigger scale than Obama’s recovery program, it’s open-ended, and it’s not voted upon. In fact, apart from the fact that the Fed chairman is nominated by the president, the actions of the central bank are not merely undemocratic but intensely secret, with minutes of its Federal Open Markets Committee (which debates decisions like the raising of interest rates or QE) only released three weeks after decisions are made. The Fed therefore never has to engage the public in real time about its decisions. Instead, it hands down edicts, and Wall Street watches for clues into its mysterious behind-closed-doors deliberations…”

Matt Taibbi